He had chiseled facial features, he displayed physical dominance over every living thing, experienced one moment of self-doubt before the final battle, possessed more intuition than the oracle whose intuition he was to depend on, screwed an un-screwable woman while poisoned & subsequently bragged about it, and he began his journey under the tutelage of an old sage named Old Man… who would enlighten the youngster as he practiced attacking things… as budding Gods do.

If you hadn’t noticed, Immortals was produced by the same producers of the movie 300. So, yes, the movie was visually stunning. Like 300, Immortals was filmed primarily in Sepia. Nobody knows why, but the 300 production team clearly has an affinity for both warfare and old-fashioned photographs.

I almost forgot to mention their obsession with masks.

Hypothetical pitch meeting:

Producer: “We’re doing another war film, it’ll be shot in Sepia again. It’ll be a historical hodgepodge, but what should the focus be?”

Head Writer: “I’m not entirely sure, but it would probably involve evil masks. The Medieval Jabawockee look worked well in 300”

Producer: “but we’ve already done that…”

Head Writer: “And people loved it.”

Producer: “………….. I like it”

Embarrassing resemblance.

Mickey Rourke (King Hyperion) plays a convincing menace, but dressing him as a Venus Flytrap diminished the villainy.

He looked like a Pokemon, which would have been genius if it were intentional.

For this overly masculine-a-movie, you would not expect for there to be so many wardrobe changes. Madonna during concert? Yes. Mickey Rourke? No. Immortals definitely had some Metrosexual Man-vogue going on, but that made it interesting.

See? King Hyperion is part Venus Flytrap, part Pokemon, and part Jabawockee. A hodgepodge of hilarity. Immortals was as unintentionally funny as it was ultra-violent and action-packed.

For instance:

The Athenian Army of 57 men faced off against King Hyperion’s army of what appeared to be 2,000,000. No big deal. Clever camera angles & film editing killed maybe 1,999,877 of them itself, leveling the playing field.

The Braveheart moment fell flat on its face. With the sudden & synchronized clanking of their armor, it turned into an Under Armor commercial. They must protect this house.

Hyperion signals for his men to charge, the Athenian Army lost all desire to fight, Theseus spoke to them, they ignored 89% of his speech, & they instantly regained the courage to fight an army that initially outnumbered them 40,000 to 1. And the rest is history….fabricated, history.

Here’s an example of how pivotal the Theseus Fog of War speech was:

Soldier: “Who are you to tell us what to do!!?”

Theseus: “I am no one to tell you what to do, I am Theseus”

Now that, is leadership.

In nearly every meeting hosted by King Hyperion, he arbitrarily killed one of his henchman for being the bearer of good news, bad news, or just news. He doesn’t like news.

Too many cuts to the Barbeque Bull. Ok, we get it, being inside of that thing sucks.

The Eagle in the movie wasn’t a symbol, it wasn’t paying homage to Falconry, the screeching Eagle shot was just there.. the entire film. Subliminal American Eagle product placement?

The preferred attack of choice was to the throat or to the inner-thigh. It was odd. Observe how many people fell prey to a well-executed throat or inner-thigh attack… In Immortals, a well-placed lower-inner-thigh attack was like a Halo head-shot. “Lost, the lead. Gained, the lead”

There was an extravagant display of God-on-God violence, when Zeus slayed the disobedient Ares with an Inferno Whip. This made Theseus a believer. Sorry, zealots. He saw actual Gods, & they yelled at him. I’d be convinced too.

Athena played Mystique, from X-Men, in her first scene with Zeus. Be yourself, Athena.

To appease a mortal movie audience, they employed Spartacus: Blood and Sand-esque slow-motion fight scenes to simulate how fast Gods are, and how slow we are.

The film makers poked fun of Greece being the supposed origin of civilization, democracy, & their obsession with diplomacy with this scene:

Greek King: “Let us negotiate”

Hyperion: *Head Chop*

Greek King: “………………………….”

I strongly urge that you watch Immortals. If not for the comedic fodder, then to nourish your primitive affinity for combat. Or, in this case, Immortal Kombat.

I am @ironsheek. Enjoy the trailer:

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About Travanti

I'm an actor, satirist (read that slowly, or you could get the wrong idea), comedic writer (contingent upon who finds my work funny), & macro/microcosmic social commentator. An alum of the University of Louisville, and Syracuse University (Newhouse Television Radio & Film M.S.)... aren't I being shockingly cavalier about it all?

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It’s probably one of the best-looking films of the whole year (yet, I still haven’t seen Tree of Life) and the action is awesome and in-you-face which is something I always like. The story dragged on a bit and I couldn’t help but think that if the writing was a tweaked a little better, this would have definitely been a very solid film. Instead it was just fun and pretty to look at. Good review.

I agree, it was very nice to look at, but it seemed like they only hoped to special effect you into submission, which they did effectively. For instance, the quest for the Empirus Bow? There was no quest for the Empirus Bow. Just “Hmm, what’s this? Oh, that’s cool”, it could’ve added depth to the journey. If they would’ve cut 64% of the torture bull scenes and eagle scenes (there were that many) then they could have afforded to include that. Like you said, the writing could have been a little better.